Friday, Nov. 17, 2006 | 6:54 a.m.
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Motorists traveling along Interstate 15 near Blue Diamond Road might want to give that tractor-trailer in the next lane a little extra room. Especially if they notice it sporting a diamond-shaped placard saying "Radioactive 7."
There's a good chance it's hauling one of the roughly 1,200 annual shipments of low-level radioactive waste that travels near, and occasionally through, the Las Vegas metropolitan area.
Although low-level waste in the past was generated from nuclear weapons production and testing, more recently it has originated primarily from cleanup activities at sites throughout the country. Much of the waste that has passed through Nevada in recent years has come from plants nearly 2,000 miles away, at facilities in Ohio and Kentucky.
"It typically consists of personal protective clothing, dirt and debris," said Darwin Morgan, public affairs director at the Nevada Test Site.
Tons of it, all contaminated to some degree, come through the valley on a regular basis on its way to disposal at the Test Site, about 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.
The trucks typically cross into Nevada on I-15, then head west on State Route 160 (a portion of which is known as Blue Diamond Road) southwest of Las Vegas and travel that road north to the Test Site.
Although an accident damaging the contaminants' sealed containers is not considered life threatening, there are risks, says Bob Loux, executive director of Nevada's Agency for Nuclear Projects.
"You would likely have to come in direct contact with it or hold it," Loux said. "That's not to say there aren't dangers from prolonged exposure. If it got in the air, there could be safety issues."
City, county and state officials, while acknowledging the shipments' inevitability, would like to at least know in advance when a truckload is headed through the valley.
They don't, however.
Only the Energy Department and trucking companies know the shipments' schedule. The reason they don't pass along the information to local or regional officials is not a matter of national security or because of a potential terrorist threat. It's simply because they don't have to.
Morgan points out that companies transporting other hazardous materials that routinely pass through the valley are not required to submit schedules.
"Is there a reason that we should?" Morgan said. "The trucks are marked."
That answer displeases Las Vegas officials.
"I have a hard time swallowing that," Councilman Steven Ross said. "I feel like we're in a battle with another country and it's the DOE."
Since 1973, there have been only four accidents across the country that resulted in the release of radioactive material during the transport of low-level waste, according to the Energy Department. None of the accidents resulted in death or serious injury, federal officials said.
That, however, is of little comfort to Las Vegas leaders, who stress that when it comes to accidents involving radioactive waste, even one can be too many.
"This is an accident waiting to happen," Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said, arguing that the city is entitled at a minimum to know of the shipments in advance.
Energy Department officials' reluctance to provide information about low-level shipments at a time when they are lobbying to bring more dangerous waste into the state for disposal at Yucca Mountain - a plan that, even if it wins congressional approval, is at least a decade away - disturbs many.
"Frequently the DOE is its own worst enemy in these things," Loux said.
The advantages of advanced notification, Loux said, include being able to provide emergency personnel with routing information and the ability to independently monitor drivers to ensure route compliance.
Currently the only monitoring is done by Nevada Highway Patrol troopers, who sometimes call the Agency for Nuclear Projects if they see a truck coming through, Loux said.
Energy Department officials said the last time a truck strayed from the preferred route was 2004, when three trucks carrying oversized loads came through the Spaghetti Bowl, the I-15 and U.S. 95 interchange. In that instance, the trucks had received permission to change routes.
Loux, however, said the Highway Patrol spots about three trucks a year traveling on I-15 beyond State Route 160.
Drivers are required to keep logs and fill out forms listing the route traveled when they arrive at the Test Site.
Kevin Rohrer, a Test Site spokesman, admits that officials basically take drivers at their word. While the Energy Department requests that drivers use the preferred routes, interstate commerce laws prohibit making that mandatory.
Officials at trucking companies that haul the waste either refused to comment on the shipments or did not return calls to the Sun.
Global positioning systems could easily and relatively inexpensively track the shipments. But Rohrer, again citing interstate commerce laws, said that the Energy Department would have difficulty requiring trucking companies to use GPS tracking.
Even if every shipment followed preferred routes, the Energy Department still could run afoul of its own standards because of the region's growth.
With public safety being the department's top priority in handling low-level waste, its primary strategy for achieving that goal is to avoid heavily populated or congested areas in Nevada.
Local officials say that while preferred routes established in the late 1990s aimed at avoiding the Spaghetti Bowl and Hoover Dam may have achieved that goal for a time, the region's rapid growth has changed the situation. Today, the area around State Route 160 is heavily populated and the road itself is congested.
"That is a legitimate argument," Rohrer said.
But apparently not good enough to make the Energy Department alter its routes.
Of 362 low-level waste shipments to the Nevada Test Site in the third quarter of this year, 313 used State Route 160, according to Energy Department figures. Of the remaining shipments, 24 originated north of the Test Site and 25 came from California.
There is a Energy Department-preferred route that would avoid Clark County, one that involves taking California State Route 127 from I-15 north to the Test Site.
Rohrer, though, said the route is not a viable alternative because it is a remote location and cannot accommodate the increased truck volume. In addition, it would be difficult to get medical personnel to the area in the event of an accident, he said.
That leaves all involved pondering this irony: An agency that for safety reasons wants to keep potentially dangerous shipments away from densely populated areas eschews a less populated route - because it is too remote.
And because of that, the shipments will continue to brush against a city where hope of beating the odds is nothing new.
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